Uniquely Singapore

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Please don't conclude that this blog is devoted to ridiculing Singapore..it's just that this "unique" place makes me go into peals of laughter everyday, about something or the other. Here are some things that made me laugh for the past two days.

****Block supper and exam goodie bags.
Here hostels are called halls. Each hall is divided into a number of blocks. My hall is really blessed. Just go two levels above my room, and you can see my whole university and some of nearby Singapore too. Why they built this block atop a hill is something I can't understand. As I told in one of my previous blogs, many of my friends simply refuse to come up to my room, because of the mountain of stairs they have to climb. Un malaiya yeri un roomukku varathukku naan India poi thirupathi malai-ya yeralaam; punniyamaavadhu kidaikkum. Well, I don't blame them.
Ok, I'm digressing. Block supper.
These hall students' committees organize block suppers every month or so. I've never attended a single one because they don't have any vegetarian (also sensible veggie) food for me to eat. But yesterday was the last block supper for this year. So senti poattu, I attended this one and just stood about and chatted away as others happily ate. Boy, their juice also didn't taste good! Then they gave medals to some people(for what I didn't know..) and then we all went back.
Then one girl from the committee came to my room with two bags (ya, ya, they were goodie bags! :) )
"Hi...your roommate there or wad?"
"No..she's out"
"Ok la, these two exam goodie bags leh...give your roomie also eh? Gulluck (no brownie points for guessing it's goodluck) for exams! Oh i forget...inside there are 'suvvey' forms leh, about hall 9 la...please fill and put them on your door and we'll collect le..."
"ya, sure, goodluck to you too...goodnight!"
I closed the door and checked out the exam goodie bag. Cha! Last sem's exam goodie bag was much better.
This sem it had a huge box of ready to eat noodles (which I got to dump on someone), numerous discount forms for things ranging from hair salons to contact lenses to skating entry fee discounts.
Hmm..quite interesting.
Then,
"Heritage Jia Jia Liangteh Sugar Free Herbal Tea"
You need a very strong mind to drink this tea. It's more like the tea water thingy we get after straining the tea powder + water (ayyo.. I forgot what it's called...dicoction?)
Duh, nothing useful till now (ya, the survey form too...).
Hey, there's something else big and bright.
FHM magazine.
I thought it's a women's magazine.
Well, no...it was a men's magazine.
(No, no don't think otherwise, they gave it to me, I didn't ask for it!! )
Wah...what a book to read before the exams!!!
Think of an exam subject like this:
Paper: FHM and it's important lessons.
Time : 2 hours
Topics:
Singapore's 100 Hottest Girls Next Door
Thai bar dancers
FHM s** class




Questions:
1) Who features in the "Wet and Wild" section of FHM's October 2004 issue? (adapaavi! October 2004 issue-va!!! Dhrogi!!!)
2)Explain with reasons who is the hottest Singapore's next door girl
3)What do Thai girls talk about in the issue?



:))
I can't believe it!!!! lol....Is this some kind of incentive to get down the guys to study?
This exam goodie bag ultimately did not have anything related to exams, not even a pen.
I now looked at the survey form. Some drab questions, sidily giving me nice nice information about hall 9, trying to entice me into staying in this *damned* hall the next year also.
Poda, unga jambamellaam balikkaadhu!!!
I'd gone to the block supper with a bad headache.
After another two hours, it changed to stomach ache...sirichu sirichu vairu vallika aaramichudchu!

***SDU
SDU stands for Social Development Union. This is the the organization founded by Singapore Government to get more Singaporeans to date, fall in love and get married. Eppo indha velaiyellam government aaramichadho... see what SDU has become:
Sad, Desperate and Ugly.
ya, I know, it's such a sad situation that it has been termed thus.
Today, we saw a group of final year students from my school showing their project to us. The video showed us differing views of the SDU and many other issues like that.
I found it really funny that Singaporeans actually need an organization to monitor over them, arrange for dates, get them married and so on. Worse than this is the baby bonus. You have no idea how shocked I was to know that the Singapore government was giving married couples incentives to have more children.
$XXXXX for your first child, $XXXXX for the second child, $XXXXX for the third child, some more for the fourth child.
All these policies are announced on August 9 every year, which is Singapore's national day, when the PM addresses the nation.
I'm sure the next year, they'll fully agree to sponsor a child's education and health care costs if he is the fifth child!
Well, I personally feel that all this is quite a sad state of affairs - money for getting more children??
Immediately after this "baby bonus" scheme was announced, there was a flurry of discussions.
What can we do if youngsters simply don't want to get married?
The answer is simple.
Marriage Bonus!!!!
ya, these do exist, I'm not kidding. Youngsters get some incentives to buy a residential flat easier if they were married than if they were alone. Sounds like our tamil movies' house owners' conditions right?
I sometimes don't know what to do in a place like this. Best is to ignore and laugh it off. That seems to be rarely possible as teachers always turn to us international students for opinions on such policies.
"Vani, what do you think will the reaction if you go show this video to your friends in India?"
lol....it will be the best comedy video we've ever seen!
Hmm..I just realized this is a looo....ng post.
For those of you who reached till here, thanks!!!! :)

10 comments:

Krish said...

I am reminded of this song from the Rajini starrer of yester-years "Priya" -: akkarai cheemai azhaginile manam aada kandene, pudhumaiyile mayangugiren. I'm sure you are going thru the same feelings now. So, what to do? "No thangamani read parents, ensoy" :-)

Chakra said...

SDU - avanga panra velaikku namma oorla vera peru.. :)

Harish said...

Government "Agency"-nu sollumbothe doubt aanaen :)

andha magazine vendaam-na, why dontcha fwd it to me? :D

Vani Viswanathan said...

ahahah
thennavan, correct, ensoy dhaan, aana, vera edhaa vishayam irundha nallaarkum! ;)
chakra sampath,
i know!
harish,
nanba, idhu seriya illa! no probs chennai varachey kondu varen! ;)

Unknown said...

Incentives for kids-a? Hmm...Laloo Prasad Yadav SIngapore-la piranthu irundha erumai mattu pannai-ku bathil nooru delhi pasu vaangi mechiruppar. Paavam, luck illa avarukku.

India-la indha maadhiri ellam scheme introduce pannina pasanga poonthu vilayaadiduvaanga, me inclusive..cha :)

Sriram said...

Ammani, thaangal petror idhai padippargal endru nalla penmani-aaga ezhudhukereero? Sodhappal.. sangha tamizh = no.. me = chennai tamil. Nice to see you pour out everything.. if u can. stop providing these lil details on the blog like your address and so on. They might come back to haunt you. p.s : drop by my blog to experience the "sad side of freedom" ;) will comment again. gotta run.

Anonymous said...

hi vani

I used to visit your site regularly.. got to know about this, thru my friend.

I am working in Singapore for the past 8 years.. I had gone thru your comments, which is similar to some of my friends circle comments. Eventhough, I am not Sing.govt Pro, I believe that we need to appreciate some of their efforts.

As a political machine, this govt has the responsibility to build the nation. That's what they are doing. In India, the politicians will be building their own wealth. Even if they were more given cash, it may go into the drains. On this count of taking ownership, we need to appreciate Sing govt. This has given them the No.1 spot in the world map, in many aspects.

May be Singapore Govt is spoon feeding the public a lot. I feel that Spoon-feeding is better than taking the Spoon from the public (like corrupt Indian politicians). Pl. read JUNIOR VIKADAN and you will wonder why these guys in India are doing so much!!!!

The reason for the Sin.govt to give incentive is that the educated mass is moving away from having children and are career oriented. So, they limit themselves with one child. But Singapore Govt wants its population to hv more children, since it doesn't want to depend on Expats always.

In India & China, they hv young generation for the next few decades to survive. so, they need not bring in these kind of policies.

Also in India, if you take the new generation, they are not going for the second child, after the first. Reason is the career & expenses. So, Indian youth is also following the path, which Singporeans did few years back. You may not observe the same situation of less popltn growth in India, because we hv the poor who don't mind giving birth to more kids. (Educated generation is definitley not willing to hv more children, even in India. Pl. make a note)

So, I believe, that the responisbility taken up by the Sing Govt. need to be appreciated. I hope you will step into their shoes, as to why they are doing. (FYI, world wide birth rates are falling - may be except in India & some Muslim countires - which is being addressed by SING GOVT in a diff. way).

For your info, Italian Govt is taking so many steps to get their young generation married and get more chilren. ITALY has one of the lowest population growth in Europe. May be Chakra, can validate this!!!

this post is not to contradict your views. I am just supplementing your post with my views, so that guys visiting your site should not hv wrong impression about the place where you are studying... May be, you will work here for some more years.

Anyhow, I enjoyed your "singlish".

rgds

Sriram said...

Ram, no one will me "mistaken" by V's posts. Tis just her views, and I don't think it wud matter at all if someone gets a "wrong" opinion abt Singapore. Sorry Vani, couldn't resist that! :d

Eroteme said...

hahahahah. I loved this post. The best part of it was this:
"Ok la, these two exam goodie bags leh...give your roomie also eh? Gulluck (no brownie points for guessing it's goodluck) for exams! Oh i forget...inside there are 'suvvey' forms leh, about hall 9 la...please fill and put them on your door and we'll collect le..."

I couldn't stop myself from laughing. I have heard them talk too (especially when one customer asked me "thith will walk light?" And I wanted to tell her that with the software her company bought you can't walk, light or heavy!! But then you have to be nice to them and say "Rest assured. This will definitely work"), but I was busy parsing their words to actually note these things down. Nice.

The next thing that set me rolling was:
"1) Who features in the "Wet and Wild" section of FHM's October 2004 issue? (adapaavi! October 2004 issue-va!!! Dhrogi!!!)"

:-)) You sure have a nice sense of humour.

Do read Ram's comment too. What he says does make sense although we all know that these blog posts are more like your giving vent to what is happening to you out there than against anyone or thing... ;-) esp. when you miss out on the rasam back home!!!

Nice read. A good laugh before I went to sleep....

Krish said...

I wrote you a reply as soon as I saw your reply to me asking if I went to DAV, but that comment never appeared somehow. Blogger to blame again. So, here goes my reply again - I did not go to DAV but went to National English School, another CBSE school nearby to DAV, which is now National Public School. Ever heard of it?